A Lark Ascending

Vienna: Empire, Dynasty and Dream (BBC 4) Interesting if irritating three parter - suffered in the last 30 minutes from recycling the same old cliches about Freud, Klimt, Alma Mahler and Hitler - "Vienna, a city in political decline but the birthplace of modern thought...blah! blah! blah!". Presented by yet another effin' public school boy (Simon Sebag Montefiore) posturing in a hat. Didn't help that the camera kept getting in really close to his face when he was making grandiose statements.

West Sussex, UK - A woman walks her dog as the early morning fog clears near Copthorne Photograph: Gareth Fuller/PA https://www.theguardian.com/news/gallery/2016/dec/22/best-photographs-of-the-day-storm-barbara-aleppo-snow

Disc 4 of the Telemann.

No music is 'timeless'. But some gets canonised, often not for musical reasons. 'Halls of Fame' seem one of the more awkward approaches to canonisation.

The reputation of Yes fell foul of the critical orthodoxies that began to emerge in the early 70s and became standard writ from about '76. I'm always amused when I read younger 'critics' in The Guardian etc parroting this line...uncritically! As a 16 year old hearing them for the first time in 1971 (on record) they were so fresh (I was only aware of rock, pop and an endless stream of Radio Two M.O.R./light classics at the time) - this was a world where the 'album rock' area was dominated by plodding blues bands. What appealed to me were the constant and unusual key changes, the fragmented structures where themes would emerge, vanish and then reemerge, often transformed later on (I knew bugger all about classical music at the time but the relatively simple way they did that was easy to hear). But above all, there was a poppiness to their songwriting that offset the flashier side (I can still recall waking up the morning after buying 'The Yes Album' with all these wonderful bits of tune buzzing round my head and putting the record straight back on) - I half suspect that came from Broadway/Hollywood musicals as much as 60s pop. The run from their first album to Tales of Topographic Ocean was marvellous and I still get great pleasure from those records. I heard two or three in passing after that but they were missing what I'd liked - but I did like 'Magnification' from 15 or so years back. Strong poppy songs (or song fragments, stitched together into suites, which is what they really did) again. I'm always astonished they continue to find new listeners as I'd have thought they were very much of their time. A bit like my Dad's Vera Lynn records which I used to mock mercilessly until he gently said to me once 'If you'd been around in the war you'd think differently'. Hell is other people's musical enthusiasms.

Europe's oldest pagans: the deep forest life of Mari people (Russia) https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/gallery/2016/dec/21/europes-oldest-pagans-mari-people-ikuru-kuwajima

Nicola Farnon (vocals, bass), Dave Newton (piano), Jim Mullen (guitar) and Steve Brown (drums). (The Lescar, Sheffield) Last gig of the year and a perfect ending. I only know Farnon by name and by a reputation for always selling out her concerts (this one sold out weeks in advance). Didn't even know she sang. Comes from Wiltshire, lives in Sheffield - all the stars are on her side (apparently her great uncle was arranger Robert Farnon). Song based, mainly very familiar standards with some of her own. Not a perfect voice but one full of character and smoke (if I was hip I'd say it had 'lots of soul (man)'); an utterly infectious personality, just alight on the bandstand. Lots of space for marvellous solos from Mullen and Newton - Newton got much more space than in the octet I saw him in last week. Especially good on the bossa-ish numbers where he seemed to have channelled Jobim's minimalist style. Don't think I've seen Mullen for 20 years (somewhere in the same part of town) but he was as good as ever. Great drumming too. A million miles from egghead jazz but had a packed backroom of a pub absolutely ecstatic. I'm almost inclined to say 'Man, they really swung' but I won't as then I'd have to buy a beret.

Disc 3 of the Telemann; 53 of the Bach - mainly 4th Sunday of Advent cantatas including 147 with the famous tune. Off Spotify. Someone I've read about (and seen mentioned here) but I got curious after an enthusiastic recommendation by someone I was chatting to in a concert. Turned up in a book I was reading yesterday so gave it a crack. Really liked the last piece in particular which does a wonderful job of drifting to some distant plain at the end. Always like a trip through the Sibelius symphonies in the dark time of the year. No. 1.

I'm way too posh to shop at Iceland (though not hipster enough to shop at Lidl). Two part Xmas edition of 'Last Tango in Halifax'. Disappointing - thin, silly 'ghost' storyline, way too many potential themes thrown in and undeveloped. Some of the acting even looked a bit unrehearsed (not just the amateur dramatics parts). Wainwright has a great eye for niggling family tension and it was on display here - but I'd not be surprised if she was rushed into this 'Christmas Special'.

Hooray! Days start drawing out tomorrow.

Utterly bonkers but thoroughly enjoyable nativity opera from one of the grand English eccentrics. Standard early-20thC English opera with sudden interjections of familiar carols and occasional outbursts from West Country 'rude mechanic' types. I love this description of the 1925 performance from the liner notes: "The rising tide of his career came to a sudden halt, however, in December 1926 when, horrified by the injustices of the miners' lock-out and subsequent General Strike, he decided to change the nature of a production of Bethlehem that had been scheduled for Church House, Westminster, and present instead a blunt declaration of political faith. Abandoning the customary medieval setting, he showed a Christ born in a miner's cottage, and a Herod that was the very embodiment of top-hatted capitalism. The scandal was immense and the production lost money. Unfortunately he had not consulted his fellow directors: recriminations followed and it was decided to wind up the activities of the Glastonbury Festival Players."

I have a bad habit of enjoying most of the music I listen to but find it very hard to pin down ten records of the year (much easier to do with 2006 where enough time has elapsed to know just how permanently they are going to feature). The two jazz releases that stick in mind - and probably for no other reason than that they are people I've obsessed on for decades: The record that returned to the CD player and iPod (!) again and again: I think most of my newer (to me) discoveries happened in the...a-hem, adopts refined accent...'classical' part of the record shop. Sticking to the newly emerged, this one knocked my socks off:

Get this: Don't think it's currently in print but it's probably available s/h. Mostly Delius miniatures (which to my mind are where you find the best Delius) but also has the sprawling 'Appalachia' which is part Dvorak, part 'Porgy and Bess'. Most is on the big EMI Delius box but that is probably for Delius obsessives only. Disc 5 of the Nancarrow. Extraordinary music - both Nancarrow and Kurtag are new to me this year, thanks to the live performances of the Ligeti Quartet. Very taken by the Kurtag. The early pieces on the Szymanowski are a bit over the top - very R. Strauss - but I like the Fourth. SQ 1 and 2. Went mad on these old favourites in the spring. First listen for six months - think the Kurtag set me off.

Odd book. Part history, part travelogue, part tour of the moth collections of dull provincial museums. Winder is a self-confessed life-long Germany/Central Europe obsessive and seems to randomly visit out of the way places. All done with a Brysonish comedy which sometimes comes off but at times becomes a bit 'aren't foreigners funny'. Reminded me of a lot of history I'd once lived in (17th/18thC) but also made sense of some of the more confusing bits (everything before The Reformation). Intrigued me enough to start something rather more serious: Clark wrote the brilliant 'The Sleepwalkers', as good an account of the causes of WWI as I've read. This one has started well.

Yes, I enjoyed those two as well - was that this year or last? Can't remember. I really enjoyed the latest series of House of Cards and The Good Wife (No 6 so not the latest) this year but they might be 2015 that I only got round to recently. You are right about Iceland. I do this all the time when mentioning it. Don't know why. Explains why I'm forever returning from the high street having failed to locate frozen goods.

Just had a quick flip through the year on this thread (see, these threads do have a purpose!) to try and work out my favourites of the year. Not easy to do as you never know how much you really enjoyed something in January compared with something in November; and how far your sense of enjoyment is affected by subsequent wider discussion. Confining to TV from 2016, what I did notice was most of what stuck in my memory was from the first half of the year. My awards (purely based on what I saw from my tiny corner of the world through my particular prejudices and predilections) go to: War and Peace Happy Valley II The A Word The Night Manager Line of Duty III Marcella Peaky Blinders III Trapped (marvellous Greenland Scandi-noir) Fleabag Overall top award goes to 'Fleabag' for its utter originality and combination of razor-edge comedy with emotional depth. Though 'Question Time' deserves an award as the TV programme I shouted at most, especially in June. What was really scary, leafing through, was how many programmes I watched which I have quite forgotten. Need to eat more oily fish.

The mind boggles!

Snuck out for a late entry for the year: My band of the year - the Ligeti Quartet - doing a hour of seasonal music for all the family at Frith Hall in Sheffield. A peculiar concoction of poems and various Christmas songs sung by the Sheffield University choir (including Joni Mitchell's 'River' which now seems to be an official Christmas carol) with suitably spiky quartet writing. Then a Malian folk tale with music adapted from West African balaphone music. An arrangement of a Tuvan throat music piece (with very jolly vocal grunts and shouts) - arranging Tuvan throat music for string quartet seems to be speciality of this quartet. Finally a reading of Dylan Thomas's 'A Child's Christmas in Wales' with the quartet providing musical illustrations along the way. All very jolly and perfect for the time of year.

The volume of the series that gathers up the odds and ends. Bridge wrote lots of occasional and functional music and you can imagine much of this being performed in palm courts in posh Brighton hotels in the early 20thC. There is a song from 1924 (by which time Bridge's ears were well tuned to radical musical developments in mainland Europe) where the orchestration and harmony sound rather like Zemlinsky. Otherwise, for Bridge-o-philes only. The rest of the series, on the other hand, has some astounding music. 18thC seasonal churchy music, absolutely awash with shepherds (and the odd angel). What Jane Austin probably sang in church at Christmas. Most agreeable.

'Modus' ended last night with blood everywhere. Not the best Scandi-noir but perfectly watchable. Second part of the Walt Disney documentary - as expected, everything went pear shaped. Did not seem a happy man. Special award to Friday night's 'Have I Got News For You' that replaced an indisposed Nicky Morgan (currently reeling in the Trousergate scandal) with a large, expensive handbag.

Can't say I care much for this - conjures up visions of 'man the hunter' beating his chest in the morning before setting out to procure mammoth steaks single-handed. The lyrics are probably about something much more uplifting but my Finnish is rusty. Another Xmas favourite.

I'd assumed you were getting the full Octet and all the Xmas trimmings. Sounds like a good evening - Barnes has many hats which he can swap nightly! He's 15 minutes up the road in March with the Nottingham Youth Jazz Orchestra (Jazz in Worksop shock...Local councillor asks 'Are our children safe?'). Different again. My nomination for Sports Personality of the Year this evening.

I really like Koechlin's music. Makes a nice place to visit when you've played all your Debussy and Ravel to death (as if you could!) but want to hear something from a world not too far away. Jean Cras is another composer from around the same time I enjoy (his day job was being an admiral; clearly knew a bit more about the sea than you'd get from observing it from a hotel in Eastbourne). Yesterday a bit thin on the posh stuff: This morning the ultimate Xmas party record:

Not come across that FRUK site before. Very useful.

Alan Barnes Octet - A Jazz Christmas Carol (Bonington Theatre, Arnold, Nottingham) ALAN BARNES (SAX/CLARINET); BRUCE ADAMS (TRUMPET); MARK NIGHTINGALE (TROMBONE); ROBERT FOWLER (SAXES); KAREN SHARP (SAXES); DAVE NEWTON (PIANO); SIMON THORPE (BASS); CLARK TRACEY (DRUMS) Suspect this particular show is part of Barnes' pension plan - absolute sell-out and the Bonington rarely sells out. His "A Jazz Christmas Carol" suite (with suitable readings and hilarious ad libs) plus arrangements of a few seasonal favourites. Parts of the suite were really very Ellington. You don't often get three clarinets (or even two baritones) in an arrangement. At one point Barnes seemed to summon up an extra ghost - Johnny Hodges. High point for me was the arrangement of 'We Three KIngs' at the end - a 3/4 piece in three parts that sounded like an outtake from 'Africa/Brass'. In the slower middle section Karen Sharp played the most beautiful tenor solo - I'll be digging out my one record of hers later. As ever with Barnes a wonderful mixture of compelling music and down to earth humour. And yes, he did dress like that! Enjoy his Yuletide joy in Manchester tonight, Bill! [Haven't heard Dave Newton live since the last Appleby about ten years back - by sheer chance I'm off to see him again in Sheffield next week with Nicola Farnon and Jim Mullen. London bus syndrome]